Heavy duty soil sampler



June 2, 1970 T. A. TOMAINE 4 3,515,230

HEAVY DUTY SOIL SAMPLER Filed July 9, 1968 r/ata L 33 4 3' 3 F j w 3 37 INVENTOR 44 I42 THOMAS A. TOMA/IVE 7 5r 4/ 4 X E) -39 ATTORNEY United States Patent US. Cl. 175-242 7 Claims ABSTRACT OF THE DISCLOSURE A heavy duty soil sampler which is composed of a driving head threadably attached directly to a hollow split barrel at the top thereof with a stabilizer plug retained therebetween and with a threadably attached hollow shoe on the bottom thereof which may be provided with a ring or flap valve between the shoe and the barrel.

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION Field of the invention This invention relates to a heavy duty soil sampler of two piece split hollow tube construction with oppositely situated threadably attached driving head and shoe which is driven into the ground to collect soil samples.

DESCRIPTION OF THE PRIOR ART While soil samplers have been in use for many years, the advent of modern construction with the ever increasing sizes and weights of buildings, bridges and highways has required far more extensive soil investigation than was previously necessary in order to provide for sound foundations adequate to support the tremendous loads encountered today.

While split barrel soil samplers have been in quite common use none have previously been without series shortcomings which has results in their having a short service life.

One of the most common problems has been that the threads attaching the shoe to the barrel have stripped or been otherwise damaged due to the unequal forces exerted on the shoe. In addition often the barrel splits at the joint where it is connected to the driving head from the same conditions of unequal force distribution existing for the shoe due in large part to the sudden shocks exerted on the driving head which are necessary to force the sampler into the soil.

The soil sampler of the present invention overcomes these disadvantages and has advantages not obtained with previous soil samplers.

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION In accordance with the invention a heavy duty soil sampler is provided that is constructed so that the forces exerted in driving it into the soil are evenly distributed over its structure at the joints between the driving head and barrel and the barrel and shoe resulting in less likelihood of breakage of the driving head, the split barrel and the shoe.

The principal object of the present invention is to provide a heavy duty soil sampler that is of sound construction and which has an increased service life.

A further object of the present invention is to provide a heavy duty soil sampler that may be quickly and easily assembled and disassembled.

A further object of the present invention is to provide a heavy duty soil sampler that is simple and inexpensive to construct and has a reduced number of parts as compared with soil samplers heretofore available.

Other objects and advantageous features of the invention will be apparent from the description and claims.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWING The nature and characteristic features of the invention will be more readily understood from the following description taken in connection with the accompanying drawings forming part thereof, in which:

FIG. 1 is a view in perspective of the heavy duty soil sampler of the present invention;

FIG. 2 is a vertical sectional view, enlarged, taken approximately on the line 2-2 of FIG. 1;

FIG. 3 is a horizontal sectional view taken approximately on the line 33 of FIG. 2, and

FIG. 4 is a fragmentary sectional view of a portion of the coil sampler shown in FIG. 2 illustrating an alternate embodiment.

It should, of course, be understood that the description and drawings herein are illustrative merely, and that various modifications and changes can be made in the structure disclosed without departing from the spirit of the invention.

Like numerals refer to like parts throughout the several views.

DESCRIPTION OF THE PREFERRED EMBODIMENT Referring now more particularly to the drawings and particularly FIGS. 1 to 3 thereof, the heavy duty soil sampler includes a head or driving portion 10, a longitudinal hollow split barrel 11 and a shoe 12. The head 10 is of cylindrical configuration and provided with an internal bore 15 having threads 16 which are preferably square threads and which receive a drill rod (not shown) which extends to the driving mechanism (not shown) at the surface of the ground. Approximately one third of the distance down the head 10 a hole 17 is drilled transversely to provide a pin retainer (not shown) which engages the drill rod (not shown) for retention of the drill rod in the head. Directly below the bore 15 an additional bore 20 is provided which is of lesser diameter with a vent 20a to atmosphere and provided with a valve seat 21 and a hollow bore 22 extending therebelow. A valve ball 23- is provided for venting which normally rests on the valve seat 21 to prevent undesired passage of water or soil thereby. The bore 22 terminates at a much, larger bore 25 forming a shoulder 26 thereby the bore 25 being provided with internal square configuration threads 27 extending the length of bore 25.

The upper end portion 28 of the barrel 11 is engaged by its threads 29 on the outside of end portion 28 with the threads 27 of head '10. The end portion 28 terminates short of the shoulder 26 and has a stabilizer plug 30 extending down in bore 31 in barrel 11 and has a flange 30a to retain the plug 30 between it and shoulder 26. The plug 30 is of a length greater than that of the threads 27 and 29 and is provided with a longitudinal hole 32 therein of the same diameter as bore 22.

The barrel 11 is composed of two halves 33 which are retained together at the upper end 28 by the head 10 and at the bottom portion 35 by the shoe 12.

The bottom portion 35 is of reduced diameter and provided with external threads 36 of square configuration engaged with internal threads 37 of shoe 12.

The shoe 12 is of the same external diameter as barrel 11 and head 10 and is of cylindrical configuration with a lower beveled portion 38 to enable it to penetrate soil and which additionally has an internal bore 39 to receive a core of soil (not shown) to be removed for analysis.

The length of the shoe 12 beyond the threads 37 is of the order of one third of the external diameter for more direct transfer of stress to and from the barrel 11.

A trap valve 40 is provided with an outer rim 41 held between the end of bottom portion of barrel 11 and a shoulder 42 of shoe 12. The valve extends upwardly into bore 31 and is normally closed by a flap 43 which is pivotally mounted to valve 40 by pin 44 and is urged downwardly to closed position by a spring 45. The rim 41 acts to distribute the force exerted by driving of barrel 11 downwardly and to compensate for misalignment between barrel 11 and shoe 12.

An alternate embodiment is illustrated in FIG. 4 wherein the valve 40 has been removed and a resilient ring is provided between the end of portion 35 and shoulder 42 of shoe 12. The ring 50 serves to cushion blows on barrel 11 to better distribute the forces on shoe 12 in the same manner as the rim 41 of the valve 40.

It will thus be apparent that structure has been provided with which the objects of the invention are achieved.

I claim:

1. A heavy duty soil sampler which comprises:

a driving head having an internally threaded portion,

a shoe having an internally threaded portion,

a hollow tubular split barrel having upper threaded end portions with which said threaded portion of said driving head is in detachable engagement,

said barrel having lower threaded portions in detachable engagement with the threaded portion of said shoe, and

stabilizer means disposed interiorly of said barrel and along substantially the length of the threaded portion of said barrel and said driving head and extending downwardly from said driving head.

2. A heavy duty soil sampler as defined in claim 1 in which:

said stabilizer means is a plug.

3. A heavy duty soil sampler as defined in claim 2 in which:

said plug has a mounting flange engaged between the upper end of the barrel and the driving head. 4. A heavy duty soil sampler as defined in claim 2 in which:

the lengthwise dimension of said plug is in excess of the length of the interengaged threaded portions of said head and said barrel. 5. A heavy duty soil sampler a defined in claim 1 in which:

cushioning means is interiorly disposed in said shoe between the lower end of said barrel and said shoe. 6. A heavy duty soil sampler as defined in claim 5 in which:

said cushioning means is a ring. 7. A heavy duty soil sampler as defined in claim 6 in which:

said ring has a valve fiap carried thereby.

References Cited UNITED STATES PATENTS 1,845,230 2/1932 Brown 175239 2,044,057 6/1936 Burt 175249 2,394,832 2/1946 Young l403 X 2,795,395 6/1957 Acker et a1. --239 3,180,438 4/1965 Dickinson et a1 175239 3,375,891 4/1968 Murati 175-403 FOREIGN PATENTS 15,907 1912 Great Britain.

DAVID H. BROWN, Primary Examiner US. Cl. X.R. 

